


The Robot Nut

by Melephs_Hat348



Category: Xenoblade Chronicles X
Genre: Alien Planet, F/F, GIVE US GAYS MONOLITH, Haelp I'm Drunk on Quirky Humor, Humor, Lesbian Character, Lesbian Sex (Eventually), Light Angst, Non-Canon Relationship, Romance, Science Fiction & Fantasy, There's A Tag For That, actually more at play, btw there's no tag for "Haelp I'm Drunk on Quirky Humor" i made it up, late to the XCX fanfiction party, nerds at work, please tags will you sort in the right order so you make sense, pls, the avatar has an actual personality, what's even the difference for nerds
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-25
Updated: 2019-10-20
Packaged: 2019-12-07 06:12:02
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 15,100
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18231008
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Melephs_Hat348/pseuds/Melephs_Hat348
Summary: Alexa has always been attracted more to skells than to girls, as it appears. In reality, she is as much of a oblivious lesbian as Brie is a clinically awkward one, which makes the latter's affection for her extremely embarrassing and painful. For a time.Related images if you like (took screenshots myself): https://imgur.com/a/Fi197qA





	1. Showing Off

**Author's Note:**

> I wonder if anyone still checks out XCX fanfiction.
> 
> So, um, yes: I got XCX around when it came out, and it has proven to be possibly my favorite game ever. I've come back to it multiple times since, and my most recent return made me want to write a GL fanfic about it, 'cause if you look at my track record, that's what I do. The problem was, who do I choose? I couldn't come up with a feasible romance that I could get behind for a good while — even Elma/F!Avatar, because somehow Elma gives off zero romantic vibes other than being hot and kinda aloof. Surprisingly, Alexa/F!Avatar really worked, so that's what I'm posting. My avatar's name is Asuka, mostly because the game's Japanese and since you can't change your character name once you make them I couldn't change it to something else, and I can't in good conscience change that up, so you'll kinda have to deal with the very similar names or pretend Asuka's name is something completely different, haha.
> 
> Edit: Turns out I can in good conscience change up her name. No longer is it the one odd Japanese name in this fic's NLA, and no longer is it problematically similar to Alexa's name. It's Brie now. So, uh, that's a problem solved, I think.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> At the behest of the ever-preeminent Mission Control, Brie heads out early in the morning on a tyrant-hunting mission with what few others are awake at such an hour.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey! First chapter in my Xenoblade X fic. It's gonna be smaller than the other ones I've done for sure, not that you'd necessarily know the size of the other fics I've written, but it should be fun. I infused my personality into this more than most other writing I've done before, so hopefully it's full of enjoyable-enough quirkiness. In this chapter, we've got appearances from a couple of other intriguing characters from X — one the epitome of peppy, one the epitome of preppy. I'm writing this late at night so whatever I just said is likely much more lame than it sounds to me now, so, uh, enjoy before I ruin the fic with my midnight ruminations, haha.

A familiar beeping pulled Brie unceremoniously out of her sleep. “Mngh, what've you got for me now, Mission Control?”

Her hand groped around on the table beside her bed, eventually finding the comm device without knocking it off. _Oh. So it's a mission I already accepted. Joy._ She swiped down a bit further. _Shuravas? That's...oh, screw that._

Before immediately tossing it back onto the table, she scrolled down to the bottom of the information give. _Weather conditions...thunderstorm?... Damn it. You can't guilt me like that, MC. You can't do that._

Brie gazed at the screen with the most thorough expression of distaste she could half-consciously muster.

_Ugh. Let's see who I can round up._

 

* * *

 

“I suppose I'll see all of you later,” Brie said on her way out of the barracks.

Elma nodded her off, still partway through her routine morning tea. “I suppose you will. Good luck with your mission.”

“Fighting a millepod in a thunderstorm is rarely my favorite pastime, but this one appears only every so often, as well.”

“You sound as if you're underestimating yourself,” she responded, briefly interrupted by Lin's (not so habitual) early-morning rustlings from the bunks. “Both of us know how many times you have singlehandedly saved the team.”

“Well, I suppose that's fair. I do have to be off now, though, so enjoy yourselves while I'm out. Give Lin my regards when she makes it out of bed.”

Her first stop was, of course, the hangar. For a moment she simply stood back from the skell, head tilted back just enough to get the full view, admiring the sleek dark violet and glowing emerald decorating the black Ares frame. “Guess this is your time, then, huh, friend?” she murmured. “Let's see how well you handle in _real_ action.”

 

* * *

 

The industrial district was rarely bustling so early in the morning, but there was at least one person Brie knew didn't conform to normal hours. One particular skell-oriented nut.... _God, even just thinking about her puts a smile on your face. Shut up_.

Instead, she ran through her head the motions for her new, slightly flashy, dismount — a completely unrelated subject. Brie had practiced it more than enough times (in fact, enough times to make it seem stupid in hindsight), but it wasn't as if she had been able to get practice within NLA itself.

_Whatever. Let's see how things look._

According to the satellite, Alexa was in the same place as usual — though absorbed in a different skell than the one from yesterday — and there was still a small bit of traffic on the main road to the Outfitters Test Hangar. She eyed the vehicles warily, looking for the safest opening possible.

In a few moments, everything was clear. _Great. No holding back now. Let's see if we can turn her on._

Transforming the skell smoothly into vehicle form, Brie sped down the road as fast as the law would let her — more due to the Ares' specs than either her nerves or her conscious decision — and took a calming breath as the hangar came into view, her focus completely unobstructed. A good two hundred feet in front of her, she slammed the brakes and transformed the skell back in one motion; it did a forward flip mid-transformation before landing again, and as she pulled its speed down to a standstill seconds later, she threw it into standby and struck the ejection seat with her left hand, catapulting out and mimicking the skell's forward flip before striking the ground not ten meters from Alexa with her feet —  with one hand's support, as she had learned was the best compromise between safety and flair.

Standing upright, she gave Alexa her signature lazy wave — more like raising her hand up beside her head, if she was honest with herself — and pretended not to be shaking. “Hey. Got any time to tag along on a mission of mine?"

For multiple seconds, all Alexa seemed able to do was stare and blink. _She's not blushing, Brie. Shut up._ Then she spoke: “Wait. That's — no, wait. Gimme a sec here. You — that's an Ares? You got an _Ares_ ?! Where did you find the resources to even commission one? Ohmygod, no, actually, is that the new model? I'm seeing some very non-70 specs there, and — no, first, what _was_ that ejection seat? Did you just use the built-in emergency eject, or did you actually customize it? It looks like it handles really well, unless that was only you, but ohmygod does it look slick! Please can I touch it I don't think I can take it much longer — ”

"You can check it out a little right now if you like, but this mission might be on a bit of a tight schedule," Brie responded, glancing at the comm device compulsively. “Weather-dependent and all that. That's the only reason I'm up this early, actually; as much as I geek out on things too, I still find it hard to parse how you manage this routine. Oh, actually, maybe I have a deal for you: help me out with this thing, and I'll let you try piloting Aeris once I'm over the initial territorialism.”

If Alexa's eyes had been wide thirty seconds before, Brie didn't know quite how to describe them now. “Oh, come on, Brie; you know I can't refuse now. I'll be ready in just a minute.”

“For your information, you'll probably be needing your skell too. This could be a little rough. I'll be back here once I gather whoever else is insane enough to be awake at this hour.”

“All right! Don't disregard that promise, okay? I'll see your beautiful skell and self then!” And with that, she hurried off into the hangar.

 _She...called me beautiful, right?_ The BLADE tried to mask her blush.

_She was charmed by the skell, you idiot. Don't get so excited._

 

* * *

 

“So, oh faithful leader, where is our destination, precisely? It would be difficult to believe that you meant 'all of Noctilum' when you stated that we were headed there.”

"Suncatch Ravine, in fact, H.B., although I can't imagine that one could call it that in this weather," Brie answered over her comm, trying to pinpoint the edge of the storm from satellite imagery.

“Yeah, I gotta be honest, it looks pretty bad out there.” Alexa's skell twisted around in the air behind them. “I hope the water doesn't get into any of my thermal charges.”

“Oh, but you probably have them extra-waterproof, just in case, right, Alexa?” said Mia. “I don't actually know how any of that works, but I bet you spend all day working on stuff like that.”

“You're not wrong. But _something_ could always go awry. I haven't waterproofed everything.”

As the group passed over the entrance to Noctilum, Brie let go of the situation for a moment. Something about the verdant plant life, the vibrant trees and flowers, the rampant waterfalls, the glittering energy mist, even the congested and complicated landscape — it spoke to her, somehow. _It may have a lot to say in a small space, and it may not care about a life so insignificant as mine, but it's beautiful, in its own quirky and deeply-involved way._

“...Hey! Hey, Chief! You're daydreaming again! Is that just a Noctilum thing, or…?”

“O-oh, right. Apologies. Yes; it’s mostly limited to this region.”

The rest of the trip was short enough, but it became many times more difficult when they breached the threshold of the thunderstorm. “Stay alert when we lower into the gorge. Colliding with something accidentally could easily be as much of a danger as Shuravas.”

“Have you ever had the misfortune to experience such an avoidable mistake?” H.B. said.

Brie sighed. “No, and people might not immediately stray from you if your natural response to anything was slightly less condescending. Looks like we’re getting out of Qing Long Glade; if perchance anyone is not yet mentally prepared, now would be a good time to change that.”

“Oh, I won’t worry about that,” Mia said. “After all, Chief, you’re seriously strong. And that new Ares — ”

“The Aghasura is supposed to be the strongest integral weapon of any Skell,” Alexa cut in. “It complements its ether gatling guns incredibly well, since the particular composition of the ether rays decrease resistance to ether-based attacks. The Aghasura itself benefits less from that, since the fuel consumption for activating the Aghasura is impossible to ignore and its cooldown us extra-long, but in Overdrive — ”

Slowing down, Brie readied her attack systems, chuckling softly. “Thank you for the preliminary advice, Alexa, but I think it would be best to focus on combat now. Does anyone have a reading?”

“Not as of yet.”

“Nope...wait, what’s that?... No, nevermind; I got nothing.”

A low screech sounded farther into the ravine — something unquestionably monstrous, unquestionably _other_.

“Well, I got _something_ big on my radar now,” Mia said. “It’s...oooh, wow, is that it…?”

Brie peered into the darkness. There certainly was something — something she had only ever seen in Oblivia under the title of (if she was remembering correctly) “calamity.” As its head emerged, expanding and contracting grotesquely with each gnashing of its endless rows of teeth, the foremost of its spiked talons carved slits through the gloom.

“A-all right. I knew this was going to be a millepod, but...damn. Everyone ready?”

“Ready as ever, Chief!”

“Likewise, though I hate to say so.”

“A little intimidated, but I know we can win. You?”

“Only mildly horrified. I don’t know why I thought battling a massive multi-mouthed bug in the dark was a reasonable choice. Let’s go, all.”

“All right! Let’s get in its face!”

Alexa charged in, her signature Excavator’s guns ablaze. Cornering the bestial indigen near the back, Mia took to work on its tail, and H.B. sighed. “I’ll manage cover before anyone does something idiotic!”

“Great — you do that, H.B. Meanwhile, I think I’ll hang back and prod at range. Mia, be careful of the end of its tail; you do not want to be there if you trigger a reflex!”

“Don’t worry; I’ve def got this covered!”

Brie launched off four energy discs from her skell’s shoulders, briefly lighting the base of its tail ablaze, but it was impossible to keep it that way in the downpour.

“H.B., how are you managing?” she asked, gliding well out of the way of a spray of blue poison directed at his skell.

The modified Formula continued to barrage the millepod’s face with plasma cannons in an attempt to retain its attention. “Reasonably. Though I doubt its tunnel-vision anger at me will last for long.”

“Don’t stress too much about it. Once I get up to Overdrive, things should get a lot easier.”

“Um, guys, I might n-— ”

Shuravas began circling in the air slowly, then faster — churning the air around them violently — until a whirlwind picked up around it, throwing all three of Brie's companions away to the edges of the gorge.

“They’re not taking us down. Anyone got some buffs?”  
“Lemme see what I got,” Alexa said, erecting an aura of her own. “Looks like we’re gonna have to end this before it gets ugly. Follow me, everyone!”

“Wait, no, Alexa, not yet — ”

“Looks like we’re just going to have to run with this,” H.B. said, grunting as he took a slew of beam needles in the side. “Superior Overdrive!”

Brie gritted her teeth, swooping in to rack up the GP. At the same time, Mia dealt the critical blow to the millepod’s tail, and it fell to the ground as the beast roared and contorted.

“Sweet! Wrecked it! Use melee attacks next while I bind it!”

“On it! Melee mode, maximum force!”

“Can anyone — I believe I find myself in need of a buff here,” H.B. said, retreating.

“Mia! Do you have anything?!” Brie said.

The adventurer evaded the brunt of a rush of homing beams before responding, “In a moment, I hope! Think you can hold out, H.B.?”

“Oh, I can always hold out.”

“Guys, I think I might be running on afterburners here — ” began Alexa, just as Shuravas stiffened, and the sudden loose of beams rushed everyone mercilessly, nearly debilitating H.B.’s and Mia’s skells — and then there was Alexa!

“Damn it, Alexa! You know you can’t Overdrive so early!” Launching off towards her falling companion, Brie caught the Excavator midair, streaking over to an outcropping to drop it at just behind her, with barely enough time to turn around before a focused chaotic beam struck her Ares.

Then she faced Shuravas directly, ignoring the sparks spraying out of the side of Aeris.  _ All right. Clearly I’m being far too fucking lenient with you, you terrifying spike demon. _

The Ares raised three oblong cannons into the air, hovering above its shoulders fixedly, and Brie set her sights on the millepod’s top fin. “It’s time to end this. Taste my wrath, insect!”

The beams struck with instantaneous effect, irreparably searing the tyrant’s fin and blasting it to the wall of the ravine, and it gave a fierce screech as it tumbled to the bottom.

To this Brie paid no mind, rushing back to Alexa’s skell — intact, but severely damaged. Alexa hadn’t yet gotten out of it. “How is it? Is anything out of order? I swear I’ll replace anything that’s broken — that goes for both of you two, as well.”

“I...was about to die, wasn’t I?” she said. “Maxima almost blew up.”

“You could probably have survived the explosion.”

“...Thank you.”

“...Yeah. No problem. So? Your skell?”

“Looks like she’ll live,” Alexa replied. “I mean, I’m still connected, so that’s one thing, but there’s really nothing broken enough that her auto-heal functions and I can’t handle.” Brie saw her pat the controls board tenderly. “It’s okay, baby. We’ll get you fixed up properly when we get back. Anyway, I can foot the bill; I mean, I chose to help you out and chose to Kamikaze Overdrive at an unreasonable point. Plus, you just bought a hecking Ares — I can’t take  _ more _ money from you.”

“Not negotiable. I’m paying some way or another for all our losses here. You said yourself there was no way you could turn down my offer when I gave it, and it was my own negligence that drew out the battle so long.” The woman sighed. “Only minutes after my reminder to focus on battle, and I nearly kill my companions in favor of fuel conservation.”

“Hey, we all have bad days. In fact, you seem to have a lot less of them than I do,” Mia said, her voice smiling a bit. “I won’t say no to a little free skell maintenance, but you really don’t need to take so much blame like that, Chief.”

H.B. started down towards the remains of their foe. “For once, I have to agree. It is completely unnecessary to take ownership over others’ actions in the vast majority of situations. Personally, I say we stop the conversation there and see what treasures our quarry holds within its quite distasteful body.”

Glancing around one more time at her compatriots, she let the matter rest. “All right. I suppose I’ll let the rest of you scour it first; I can’t say it would be my first choice to dissect a millepod, even if BLADE has only discovered two of them thus far.”

“Well, _I’m_ sure not wasting this chance,” Mia said, gliding down to the bottom of the gorge.

“Alexa? Not interested?”

“Unless by chance some of those materials are needed for a new top-secret skell, I think I’m staying up here. Don’t want insect guck on my baby.”

“Hmh. Can’t disagree with that.”

For a few minutes, the pair watched as their fellow BLADEs went to work.

“Actually, dibs on the tail spikes,” Brie said.

The Outfitter grinned. “Even after Mia severed the tail? Dang. I guess I’ll take the top fin, then. Top fin? Reverse fin? What do we call that?”

“Reverse fin sounds far more appealing.”

“Well, reverse fin it is. But I’m not taking all the credit, y’hear? If it turns out there’s some secret in the fin that leads to a whole new era of beam weapons, I’m personally naming them after you.”

Turning just a bit pink, Brie shook her head a little, smiling. “No offense, but I’d prefer not. The prospect is...a little embarrassing.”

“Aww, you’re no fun sometimes. Welp, looks like they’re done scavenging. Time to head back?”

“Looks to be so.”


	2. An Excursion of...well, Various Emotions

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Brie lets Alexa indulge in a joyride in the former's Ares, and it's not the one that eventually breaks down.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fun fact: to alight a vehicle is to get out of it. Did you know this? I sure didn't.
> 
> Shorter chapter, relatively speaking. Here's a combination of fluff, humor, unnoticed attraction, and abrupt angst. I'm prone to spoiling stuff in the notes, so I'm just gonna leave it to you to read. Enjoy :)

“Well, I suppose that’s all, then, Professor?” Brie said. “If so, I believe I must be off. Hopefully you and Veven can manage to find the right specifications for that time machine.”

“That it is,” Professor B said, “and thanks be to you for the good wishes. Come back at any time if you desire any Factory 1.21-sponsored weapons, eh?”

“I shall be certain to do so. Another time, friend?”

He chuckled. “Certainly.”

Retrieving her skell, Brie set her coordinates for the next item on her to-do list. “...And...we should be off.”

On her rear-facing screen, she caught a familiar figure waving vigorously. “Brie! Hey! Wait up there!” (Or at least, she felt as if she could hear something of that sort.)

_ Well, nothing to be done about that. _ Dismounting from the skell off the road, she hardly needed to move a foot before her friend had caught up. “Hi! How’s Aeris doing?”

“Are you sure you’re all right, Alexa? Just one sentence regarding skells before I stop you?”

“Hey, you make it sound like skells are all I care about. Which isn’t, actually, all that wrong, but still!”

“Only joking, though I know you aren’t merely here to say hi.”

She giggled, out-of-breath and excited. “Yeah, yeah, okay. You said I could check out Aeris — by the way, that choice of name is so you — remember? How’s about now for taking it for a spin?”

“Hm...let me see….” Though she knew she couldn’t physically bring herself to refuse, she drew out the response as long as possible. “If I’m remembering correctly, all I have left is — oh, but that does take some time…. All right. I think I can manage that.”

“Yeeeeess! Thank you thank you thank you so much! I’ve never even gotten to touch an Ares, so all I’ve been able to do is a crap-ton of research. I haven’t quite committed all the major specs to memory yet, but if you give me another couple days, I think I’ll maybe even be able to tell you how to fix it if one of the weapons gives out! Ooh, if I learn enough about the Ares that I can help out if you run into a problem, will you bring me on more skell missions?”

“I...don’t believe you’d need the knowledge to become more of a priority on skell missions, Alexa. You’re already one of the first ones that I turn to, you realize.”

“Aw, that’s nice of you,” she responded, smiling and shaking her head. “But I’m not  _ always  _ the best one, right? There’s always people like Lin that’d be just as helpful.”

“Sure, there are times when you’re a bit...intense about it, but you really know your stuff. Still, that’s nothing for you to worry about, much less right now. I think I have an idea of where we can go to show you its capabilities. Got your skell?”

“Actually, I looked into the Ares cockpit size, and it looks about big enough to fit two people. What d’you say? Wanna try a ride with little old me?”

“You...just want to do that so that you can get more of a look at it, don’t you.”

“Well, uh, yeah.”

_ You don’t know how much of a bad idea that would be. _ “Well, I — I suppose that could be arranged, if done correctly….”  _ Oh my god, Brie, you really can’t fucking refuse her, can you? _

“Yeah, baby! I didn’t expect that to work, but let’s get rolling, then!”

Awkwardly, Brie led the Outfitter up to the cockpit, trying to mask the scene from view. There was, obviously, but one seat in the cockpit, so after Brie found her place and moved the opposable controls out of Alexa’s way, she climbed in and found a seat on her partner’s lap — to which the former tried with mild success to limit her reaction.

“Whoa, this is incredible,” she said, reaching out instinctively to touch the sides of the spherical cockpit. “Ooh, and its weight-correction is really up-to-speed. That must be to engage combat, right? And that one is the Aghasura, I bet. And is — ”

Brie cleared her throat. “Um, Alexa, I know you’re in heaven right now, but could you try to stay in place a little while we’re heading out? I can go over some things once we’re in the air, so until then, maybe you can control your enthusiasm?”

“Oh. Right. Sorry.” She scooted back into the center of Brie's lap. Brie flushed at the sensation.

“Don’t...worry at all; it’s by no means a problem. I myself was recently reacquainted with the overpowering giddiness that comes from seeing a new skell — though, I admit, it might just as easily have been because it was to be mine.”

“Well, I’m glad you understand, but it’s definitely on me for being irritating like that. Come on, let’s go!”

Brie started the engine again, and up it rose, the bright green of Aeris’s visor and lights barely visible from the cockpit itself.

“You already got to see it back when we were dealing with Shuravas, but the jet streams do look like wings,” Brie said. “When you get to piloting it, it might be good to remind yourself that it’s lighter and has overall more reactive steering than a bigger skell like your Excavator.”

“Maxima.”

“Right, that’s the name. I remember that being an issue when I first started using it, as opposed to an Amdusias, but now it just feels a lot nicer to control for me.

“So the controls are essentially the same as any other skell model, but the Ares’ are made to look a little more aesthetically pleasing. That’s what they say, anyway. These two are the gas and brake, and the horizontal glide controls when an enemy has been targeted are on this wheel, same as the turn controls. You already guessed the Aghasura button, and the Agni one is only a bit closer to the middle there. Conversely, both the Avatara and the Vajra Flail are controlled by the right-hand battle grip. What surprised me was how only those two can be controlled manually; it does take some of the fun out of it, but on the positive side, it gives you some time to think. Here’s how you engage the boosters — ” Brie flipped the switch — “and altitude is, as always, controlled by this little thing.”

Alexa had been nodding throughout the whole monologue, absorbed, which Brie found rather odd based on the knowledge she already possessed about skells. “Are you just humoring me?”

“Only a little. It’s mostly pretty obvious stuff, but this way I don’t screw something up when flying. I don’t want to hurt Aeris. Also, now I know you know at least some of the more basic things about skells.”

“You wound me. It would be nigh impossible to pilot a skell without that rudimentary understanding.” Adjusting their trajectory somewhat, she leaned forwards and maneuvered Aeris under a low sickle rock, pressing closer to Alexa.  _ Fuck. Stop getting turned on. _

The Outfitter chuckled softly. “Y’know, Brie, I never really noticed before, but...your chest is, uh, pretty big.”

“O-oh, is that right? That’s the — first time anyone has said that.”

“...Where are we going? You never actually told me.”

“Sylvalum first, as it happens. I was planning to show you its combat capabilities in Cauldros — there’s some particular Ganglion mechs that I know you’d love to have a piece of.”

“Sweeet. Oh yeah, what kinds of maneuvering can this baby do? I know Ares are more mobile than heavier skells, but I definitely haven’t seen the specifics yet.”

At this, Brie grinned. “I suppose I could show you a little of what I’ve got. Think you have the stomach?”

“Oh, I know I have the stomach. The question is if I can stay here without being thrown out of the seat. I doubt this arrangement works that well.”

“Well, hold on...tight...I suppose. Let’s see what I can muster here.”

Shifting her position just slightly, Brie launched Aeris into maximum-velocity drive, skirting under a rock awning and corkscrewing around Arendt Bridge on her way out from Primordia. Ducking down, she pulled the skell to the water’s edge, letting one of its robotic hands drag through the water.

“Whooa — ” Alexa began.

Brie cut her off promptly with a swift upward turn that pressed both of them back up against the chair — Alexa more indirectly — and Brie pushed the skell into a barrel-roll spin that she held for multiple seconds before she straightened out, lazily tracing another corkscrew in the air at a less-intense speed.

“That was...amazing,” said an out-of-breath Alexa as they encroached upon the shores of Sylvalum at Seabird’s Beak. “Looks like you’ve been practicing a heck of a lot.”

“Altogether too much, I fear,” she responded. “There seems not to be much point to it, but it feels satisfying all the same — despite that I don’t routinely prefer such acrobatics.”

Landing the skell, Brie continued through the arch into the Hilal Meadow grounded.

“Well, I think it’s real cool. You don’t have to be productive  _ all _ the time, either. It helps when your favorite things on earth are also part of your job, but not everyone has that kind of luck. If you’re stuck doing missions and all that too often, just take some time off to do whatever. I could totes help out making an unofficial schedule for you.”

She gave a half-hearted smile — not that her companion would see it. “That would be...more work than I would feel comfortable making you put in, especially as it’s something in which you hold little interest.”

“Oh, c’mon. I’m living the life of my dreams in terms of work; meanwhile, it sounds a lot like you’re drowning yourself in missions that you don’t even like. It gets out, y’know? You’re part of Team Elma and all; you’ve got all sorts of admirers. There’s more than a couple words floating around the streets about how much time you apparently spend on ‘monotonous tasks,’ to the point that no normal human would enjoy them. Now, I’m not a gossip, but I’m seeing some real connections to what you’re saying literally right now.” Alexa turned around in the seat somewhat, making eye contact with her friend. “Are you  _ sure _ you don’t need help pulling away from all that?”

“I….” The skell slowed further. “I think...I should be fine.” Her eyes pulled away from Alexa’s. “But...thank you.”

For a long moment, Alexa gazed at her intensely.  _ Fuck; can’t you leave it alone? _ Then: “Oh, hell. Look at you.”

Eyeing the pedals, she pushed Brie's foot from the gas and struck the brake hard. As Aeris pulled to an abrupt halt, the Outfitter gripped the seatback to make sure she wasn’t knocked out of the seat and onto the pseudo-glass cockpit sphere. Then, looking back, she wrapped her arms around Brie in a tender embrace.

Something wet slipped down Brie's cheek. She tried to stop whatever was welling up inside her with a rough cough, but to no success. “D — damn it, Alexa,” she muttered, the tears flowing unhindered now; “this is so — unnecessary — ”

Then the wracking sobs took over — senseless, disgusting sobs — even as she attempted to control them, and Alexa did nothing but hold on tighter, squeezing out everything that was left. The wall that she had hardly realized she had been building broke down completely under the pressure, and she hugged back, finally dropping the little resistance she had left.

It took far too long for her to stop. “I — that — that was — an absurd — f-fuss to make,” she made out through palpitating breaths, “over some — something so s-stupid.”

“If it’s making you bottle up something like that, girl, it’s not stupid at all. I don’t care what you say; we’re doing something about your unhealthy self-imposed workload. But first, let’s have some fun, ‘kay? Wanna watch from the ground, or stay in here?”

“Whatever — whatever you prefer, actually. I-it might be amusing just to sit somewhere and watch you mess around, to be honest, but so would sticking with Aeris. I suppose I’ll at least start off with the former. Enjoy, you.”

“Oh, the one who’s going to be enjoying is gonna be you when I figure out how to put on a show,” she responded, enthusiasm getting the better of her.

Brie smiled as she alit her skell. “If you can manage it, by all means, blow me away.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Some might ask, "Where did that outburst of tears come from?" And you're right. Where *do* those emotions come from? I certainly don't know. But I imagine that Brie was not very far down the "drown myself in work" path, and thus her response to the sort of prodding Alexa gave her wasn't as guarded as it would have been if she had been able to practice against her own mind's inquisition into "is this a reasonable thing to do?" Still, it would've been nice if I could have talked about it more beforehand since it does sorta come out of nowhere with no hints that it was ever there before it was brought up.


	3. Always a Bigger, More Electrically-Endowed Fishlike Xenomorph

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> With Alexa surprisingly missing from her usual workplaces, Brie makes it her mission to figure out where she is — and what brought her there.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's, uh, been some time.
> 
> If you can't tell, I added this chapter after the "first five" that are actually now 1, 2, 4, 5, and 6. The seventh one is still in progress, because, ugh, I've been doing other things. But it's in progress, and it will come out. Sometime. I may also add an eighth for the same reason I added this one.
> 
> Anyway, this is a chapter I'm inserting partway through the fic because I realized just recently that there's practically nothing that suggests Alexa should be interested in Brie, or that she should be as close to Brie as Brie is to her. Thus, this. It's difficult, surprisingly. I think the reason why is that Alexa is, well, living her dream already. Her affinity missions and heart-to-hearts are either all about skells or just somewhat lacking in specific emotional turmoil, so it's hard to get a read on what would make her attracted to Brie for other than the superficial parts. Then again, I guess it's not too much of a problem. Plenty of healthy relationships certainly come from a comforter-comforted connection (though some others doubtless result in failure). Anyway, we're gonna see what we get with this, 'cause it's sort of the best I've got. Enjoy!

“...Well, if Lin's calling you out on it, you should probably take note,” Elma said.

“Yeah...I guess it's more than just my combat skills that need some work….” Gwin sighed. “Well, uh, I'd better get going, I think. Oh — but I gotta pay you back for that rifle.” He walked over quickly, fishing out his comm, and sent Brie a notable sum.

“You realize this is far more than the cost of that rifle,” the Curator said.

“Don't worry about it. I should head off now, though. See you all later. And thanks. Seriously.” He waved on the way out of the test hangar.

“That being done, I should leave as well,” said Brie.

“Another mission? Don't overwork yourself,” Elma said.

“Well, it's...something along those lines, but don't worry about me.”

Lin fixed Brie with an odd look for a moment, then smiled. “Well, if you say so. You two have fun!”

Brie blinked, then put a hand to her face. “...Thank you. Until later, then.” And she was off, trying to ignore the second, new odd look that Lin shared with the colonel.

Outside the hangar looked, unfortunately, to be missing a certain individual. Brie hastened up to Tika. “Excuse me — do you happen to know where Alexa is?”

“Hey, Brie. Probably down around the restricted hangar. Why? Is she causing trouble again?”

“Trouble? Alexa? Never ” The Curator smiled. “Thanks for the info.”

With Aeris as her steed, it was barely any time until she made it to the hangar entrance, and she was on the ground in seconds on the lookout for the redhead.

Mika and Camber were, of course, in the hangar as well, so they were the first ones she turned to. “Seen Alexa anywhere around here?”

“Oh, yeah, she was here a little while ago, but she said she needed to go somewhere.” Camber rubbed at the back of his neck. “Actually, I thought she was going to see you, but I guess that wasn't her plan.”

_ Me? Why? _ “Well, thanks anyway. Either of you have any ideas?”

“Maybe she's...hm...I don't have a clue, actually.” Mika gave an apologetic smile. “But her skell's still here, so she can't have gone  _ that _ far. If you find her, see what's keeping her from her job, okay? It's got to be important if she'd leave skells behind.”

“Of course. Thank you.”

Hurrying back to Aeris, Brie tried to brainstorm where a skell buff could possibly go other than to work on skells. She took off to scan NLA.

The Industrial District had to be the first place to look. That said, it was also one of the more difficult ones to survey by skell with the rather common overhangs in the area, and it was a considerable time before Brie finally decided she’d checked everywhere.  _ Might as well head to an easier section, just to eliminate it. _

It was an extremely easy task to check the Residential District. Not only did Alexa have no residence there as a BLADE, there was very little reason for her to be there comparatively. That was what made it surprising when her skell identified a figure leaning against the railing that kept them from falling off into the water below as her Outfitter companion.

Landing quite a distance from Alexa, Brie tried not to hurry over. She pulled up behind her friend quietly before saying, “Hi.”

“Ah — um — hey, Brie. What’re you up to here?”

“I could say the same to you. Don’t see you often in the residential district.”

“Well...I got to meet a dog earlier. That was pretty cool. I never can believe how real they look! I mean, its fur is so bushy, it feels really good to pet, and it even barks and bites you when you step on its tail!”

Brie had to smile. “I don’t want to ask whether that part was an accident or not. But, uh, that doesn’t seem like why you’re still here, right? You have skells to get back to, after all.”

“Nothing gets past you, huh? Yeah...I was just thinking out here a little.”

“Anything about?”

“Ganglion tech, I guess. All that stuff.”

“They have a heck of a lot of interesting innovations in those mechanoids of theirs, huh? The skells too.”

Alexa nodded. “Yeah. A lot of stuff.”

“You don’t seem too excited by it.”

“No, I mean, I am. There’s so much that we can learn from it all. One machine is a gold mine. That’s...sort of what’s worrying me.”

Brie stayed quiet.

“You know some of the stuff. Have you seen Luxaar’s Xern out in Sylvalum? It could kill an Ares with a thought. That’s what I think sometimes when I see some of the stronger Ganglion tech, like, this could destroy all of New LA if they caught us off-guard. When I’m working, it’s usually what I say to myself in awe, but when I really have time to think about it...that’s kinda scary.”

“Well, you don’t have to worry about NLA going anywhere. We have some damn good pilots and some damn good skells, and it’s especially not going anywhere on my watch.” Brie smiled a little. “As little as I say it, there’s a lot of stuff here that I don’t want being blown away. Including some people.”

“That’s….” Alexa tried to smile, but couldn’t quite manage it. “Wh...I...that’s supposed to comfort me, right? That’s a good thing. So — why does it make me feel so — so weird?”

_ Pretend you know what you’re doing. That should help. _ She cautiously rested a hand on Alexa’s shoulder, steeling herself, throwing away the selfish fantasies for the moment so she could look her in the eyes. “Reassurance doesn’t always make you feel better the same way. You can express whatever that may be in any way you want. Just...know that there are people that will, without hesitation, promise to make you feel safe.”

The Outfitter was having difficulty looking back at her. Instead, she pulled closer, filling the air between them with an embrace. Brie turned a bit pink as she hugged back.

“I guess...the thing about skells is...they can’t comfort you in the same way people can, huh?”

“Hopefully you’ve been all right until realizing that just now.”

“I….” Alexa sniffed a little. “I’m glad it didn’t take longer.” Brie could hear her smiling, just a little.

The two of them separated. “Did I make it awkward? I probably did. Sorry.”

“No no, it’s completely fine. Even if it had been awkward, I do that all the time too.”

“Not  _ that _ much.”

“Clearly you don’t know me well enough.”

“If I don’t know you well enough, I don’t think anyone knows you well enough,” said Alexa.

“I dunno. Elma always seems weirdly cognizant of every facet of my personality. It’s actually a little scary when I notice her course-correcting, so to speak, to avoid doing things I don’t think would bother me. Your slightly limited familiarity is much more comforting.”

The Outfitter regarded her. “Well, I think I know enough about you to say that that’s a very you response.”

“You’re probably right. If you want to know me better, maybe we should...uh, go grab a drink sometime. Or, like, an actual meal.” _And as friends so I don’t die of anxiety in preparation._ _Not like I could possibly ask that in a romantic context._

“Yeah, that’d be pretty sweet. You probably eat a lot of weird stuff, don’t you? You’re totally the type to order, like, scintimure tentacles.”

“Only red ones. Those are the only ones I’ve ever seen in Noctilum.”

“If you don’t stop being a Noctilum nerd, you’re actually gonna get zapped. And not by eating electric fish tentacles.”

Brie laughed. “Joking. Fish aren’t my cup of tea. That’s like saltwater tea, and I  _ would _ zap anyone who drank that with that oversized cattle prod of yours, if I were you. Well, suid prod. Ovis prod?”

“Brie prod if you keep it up.”

“Okay! Okay! I get it. Oh, what was the dog you came across like?”

“It was, what, a beagle, I think? Black and white and brown, kinda weird and jumpy.”

“That’s a dog, then. It might actually be one of my dogs.”

“You have a dog?” A pause. “You have _ multiple _ dogs?”

“Three dogs and three cats. For some reason, people give me them after I answer their search requests and find them.”

“What the heck!”

“I know. The preeminent Team Elma can barely take care of them in all the work we do. I’ve been thinking of giving some of them away to someone, or maybe letting people rent them long-term. For free, I guess; it’s not like I really need the money.”

“So conscientious. I bet your parents would be proud.”

Brie paused for a nearly-unnoticeable moment. “Yeah. They probably would be.”

“Oh — uhm, sorry. I don’t know how I forgot about that.”

“It’s all right.”

Alexa grabbed at Brie’s upper arm. “Hey, I gotta get back to work, but you can drop me off, right? I need more of Aeris.”

“Didn’t get enough of her last time, huh? Well...I suppose it can’t be helped.” The Curator looked away, hoping that Yardley would one day devise a means to stop mims from blushing.

“I won’t make you let me drive. You’re too heavy to sit on me that long.”

“Hey! I take offense!”

But Alexa was already on her way towards the Ares. “I don’t have to compliment you just because you’re hot,” she called back.

_ Shut up, Alexa, or one of these days I’m going to have to buy more underwear. _


	4. Diner Conversation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> On account of the failure of both Alexa and Brie to eat at any reasonable time, the pair head to Repenta for a meal.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, fun fact: when I was writing this, it got completely out of hand, and it turned out that I really liked it, so now it just gets extremely intense and technical (despite my lacking knowledge about said technical stuff) out of more or less nowhere. Identity crises, oblivious romance, and dessert, so, a pretty good mix. Hope all you beautiful people enjoy!

The last pugilith fell to Brie's Ultra Diamond Twins, and she sheathed the blades swiftly, letting her dyads return to their stored position — hovering behind her back — on their own.

“Whew, that was a bit of a workout. Glad I’ve got you around,” Alexa said, putting to rest both her rifle and javelin.

“Conversely; it’s fortunate to have you with me. Those Maximum Voltage hits probably saved my ass more than once.”

Alexa grinned. “Ooh, look at you, getting all vulgar! Didn’t think I’d ever hear that.”

“Don’t get used to it.” She started off back to her skell — her Lailah, Lila, this time, as Aeris was overkill for a number of battles. “It looks as if this is it for the mission. Headed back, then?”

“Yeah. Hey, actually, what time is it?”

“Hm, 19:15, approximately?”

“Yeesh. You probably didn’t eat before this, huh?”

She shook her head. “Didn’t seem necessary.”

“All right then; let’s stop at Repenta on our way back. Whaddaya say?”

“Oh — that is, that would work out reasonably for me.”

“Sweet. Race you there?”

“Heh. I’ll give you some leeway since Maxima is so unwieldy.”

Shooting her a playful glare, the Outfitter rubbed her hands together in anticipation. “Unwieldy? We’ll  _ show _ you unwieldy. Come on!”

  


* * *

  


“Sooo, want some tips on piloting your skell?” Alexa asked, trying in vain to keep the grin off her face.

“Shut it, you. Don’t rub it in just because you know you’re better.”

“Hey, you were acting pretty overconfident earlier. It’s only right.”

Sighing a bit more theatrically than a normal human being, Brie took a sip of her drink — non-alcoholic, in case she were hypothetically to make any moves on her friend — and placed the glass back down on the table delicately. “Incidentally, what have you been working on with the Outfitters division lately? I’ve heard rumors of some new tech in progress, but nothing past hearsay.”

“Oh, you’re not gonna believe what’s in store in the future,” she said, lighting up at the question. “I mean, I can’t really tell you the stuff that’s under wraps right now, but yeah — it’ll really be great.”

The Full Metal Jaguar leaned in a few inches farther. “You can’t say  _ anything _ ?”

“I mean...you know I’m not supposed to….”

“If you let me in on just a few meager details, I swear it’ll stay our little secret,” Brie murmured, infusing the words with as much allure as she was capable of without herself blushing at it.

“O-oh, well, I guess only a little info wouldn’t be...too big an issue. So, y’know how some really strong skell weapons have been popping up in the shops? Like, really,  _ really _ strong skell weapons?”

She nodded. “Certainly.”

“There’s...at least a couple that’re works in progress at the moment. One of my favorites is this really unique one — it’s been going through testing for awhile now; they’re having some trouble making it... _ work _ without damaging the skell, but  _ man _ does it work. I haven’t tested it myself — I’d totally wreck the skell if I did — but I’ve seen it, and it’s just  _ so _ cool. Agh, I can’t wait until it’s up for sale. But then of course I don’t have that kind of money, and I’d probably blow up Maxima and get thrown into debt again….”

“Sounds as if there’s a lot to unpack there, but it’s certainly nice to be excited about something.” Brie smiled. “Whatever that weapon turns out to be, in any case, it sounds quite intriguing. I might have to check one out when it’s perfected. Supposing I end up losing interest, I would have to sell it, but I don’t think I would mind dropping the price for a friend — an accomplice, especially.”

Alexa sighed, but couldn’t contain her own smile in spite of herself. “Oh come on; now you’re making it sound shady.”

“All business is shady business with me.”

She attempted to cross her arms in an intimidating display. Alexa blinked once, then dissolved into mostly-silent hysterics. “That’s...no, Brie! You’re too much socially-awkward geek to even...damn that’s a sight.”

“I’m being mocked.” She looked around, almost as if presenting the half-question to the others at nearby tables (but of course she had no intention of doing so). “She’s mocking me, isn’t she.”

“Oh my god, Brie, just stop before you make any more of a fool of yourself,” Alexa said through her giggles. “Our food’s here.”

“Fair enough. Ah, thank you,” she said as their waiter dropped off their plates.

“It’s no issue at all, my fine lady. Don’t worry; your food is perfectly safe — I would prefer to get to know you in a civilized fashion.”

_ Ugh, it’s one of  _ those _ types. _ “Mm, yes, that was actually quite smooth. Unfortunately, I am what you might call a ‘hardcore lesbian’ — not the sort you would want to find yourself mixed up with, I’m certain.”

Somewhat miffed, the young man glanced almost questioningly at Alexa.

“Hey, uh, don’t look at me. I’m — taken.”

“Mm. My apologies, then.” He sent off rather briskly to his next task.

“Good — Good acting? I shouldn’t be presumptuous.”

“Yeah, I was making that up,” Alexa said. “And the same to you, too, I guess. Very good performance, for you.”

_ Crap, I’m gonna have to say it. _ “Oh, um, I — that was the truth, actually.”

The Outfitter looked, for a half-second, awkward and surprised — was it pleasantly so? Brie couldn’t imagine it — but she recovered quickly. “Aww, dang, if I had known we were doing truths I would’ve said that too….”

“You mean — you’re one too? … A lesbian.”

“I am. ‘One of us,’ they say, all that. That’s cool; just another thing we have in common.”

“The similarities are eerie. Are you completely certain we aren’t the same person? Have you ever seen both of us at a bar together?” She bonked her head lightly with her knuckles as if in realization. “Oh, wait.”

Alexa laughed again. “Okay, okay, you’re very witty. Now why don’t we eat?”

For the beginning of their supper, at least, things were rather quiet. Brie ran what her friend had said through her head again —  _ She’s actually a lesbian. Oh god damn it.  _ How would she possibly manage to stay quiet about her adoration in such circumstances? The hope might easily ruin her.

“Hey, I dunno if it’s a bad thing to bring up, but how are things going with your memories?” Alexa asked.

Taking a moment to mentally resurface, she tilted her head slightly in thought. “Not...particularly well. That is to say, I haven’t made any progress.”

“I know I’ve said it before, but that  _ is _ really weird.” She took another forkful of salad. “We have robotic bodies, so something like memory loss shouldn’t be an issue. It’s possible that you hit your head or whatever while in stasis and your consciousness reacted to that as if you had a human body, but still...I don’t really get it.”

“If it’s any consolation, I don’t much understand it either.”

“Oh no, it’s not an issue for me. I mean, I dunno how I could feel all right with calling it an issue for me when it’s you that it’s really affecting, but whatever. Maybe...I’ve considered but haven’t told you this before — what do you think of the idea that maybe something familiar to you could trigger some amount of recall?”

She shrugged. “I...would by no means bet on it, but it is worth consideration.”

“I’m sure you could get some help with stuff like that from some old ECP officials. It’d be pretty weird if they didn’t have any information about the passengers they let onto the Whale stored somewhere, right? Or, of course, there’s the easier way of just trying to trigger something by seeing something that was relevant in your past….”

“That is definitely much to consider — and in fact, you seem surprisingly absorbed in this, to think about those possibilities so intensely.”

Rubbing the back of her head, Alexa lent Brie a small smile. “I’m a behavioral psych major, remember? Before skells, stuff not too far removed from this was my life. From my perspective, you’re surprisingly unconcerned about it.”

“I’m...not unconcerned, exactly, simply...it isn’t something I prefer to think about.”

“Yeah? I could maybe guess, but why’s that?”

She shook her head. “It’s...complicated. Difficult to express.”

“Hey, I’m ready to listen. Don’t worry about talking skills if that’s the issue, ‘kay?”

Putting her fork to rest, Brie nodded and took a slow, weighted breath. “I have...no clue what I might have been in the past. Wondering about it raises questions such as...um, ‘What if I was a terrible person on Earth?’ and ‘Am I the same person I was?’ and ‘If I was different back then, if I remember, what will I do?’ Knowing that I don’t remember the time on Earth, all the years I must have spent there, when everyone else does, I feel...I don’t know…lesser? As if I lack something that I need in order to be...real, legitimate, something? Like I’m not an adult; like I’m only months old; like all those experiences that are vital to personal growth completely disappeared, and all I am now is...um...a husk. Even now, those memories...it, uh, makes me...scared that maybe they never existed. I have no proof of — being human — besides my own thoughts, and I get — afraid — that...god, Alexa, am I just an AI? Am I — even less human than all of you? Nothing but some godforsaken  _ script _ taking calculated actions and feeling calculated emotions? Damn it, that’s the only reason you stick around me, isn’t it? All because I’m no — no more conscious than a f-fucking skell.”

As the last words spurted out of her mouth, Brie's head slid down into her hands, crumpling down to the table as she pushed back against the mounting tears.

“No, Brie...no no no...it’s...you know it’s not any of that, right? You’re not less than anyone else, and I’m not here because I think you’re nothing but some robot I can ogle. Here, let me prove that you’re not AI — or at the  _ very  _ very least, that you’d have to be a fucking amazing one, and if you were, you’d be no different from us mimeosomes and I’d never think of you as ‘wrong’ or ‘illegitimate’ or ‘lesser’ or whatever negative term you want to use. Look up. No, come on; stop hiding.”

Alexa nudged her companion’s forehead upwards, and when she eventually acquiesced, Brie made out through the still-falling tears a sudden worried expression form on her face. “I’m sorry; here, I can...I can help.”

Still averting her eyes, she accepted the napkin the Outfitter offered her, cleaning herself up somewhat. “...Thank you.”

“Welcome. Now, lemme beat that rubbish mentality into submission before it becomes a habit, ‘kay? You gotta be reasonable about it, or it won’t work.”

“Okay.”

“All right, then. First of all, and this is obvious, but emotions. Humans haven’t even made it remotely close to fabricating complex emotions like that. There’s so much to program that, while maybe it’s possible, it’d take a lifetime to make AI that displayed the natural emotions for every single possible situation. We barely know how all  _ human _ emotions work. It’s not feasible to think of every single situation that makes us feel anything, and that’s the only way we know how to make AI. It’s just too complex.

“Second of all, even  _ if _ some person managed that, the implementation is simply wrong. No offense, but there’re some things you clearly learn as fast as a drunk slug.” She chuckled a little. “Like, seriously, you know the basics of holding a conversation, but you’re just not good at communication. You may not be aware of this, but machine learning is extremely fast — when made correctly, they learn way quicker than humans, especially when regarding things that take us considerable time to understand. The only way you  _ possibly _ could be bad at it, considering how advanced your emotions are in this theoretical scenario, is if it was specifically programmed by someone. Who  _ does _ that? If you were a cutting-edge AI experiment, why the heck would you be programmed to be an interaction-adverse introvert? That’s, like,  _ asking _ for stagnation.”

Alexa downed another few bites of her dinner before continuing. “And third, sorta related, unless you’re hiding them really well, you don’t have any inhuman — or inmimeosome, I guess? — capabilities. The easiest thing for human machine learning is objective, information-based stuff: memory, math, logic, fast reactions. If you don’t have those abilities all the time, it sorta would make sense if you were made to be as humanoid as possible, but again, it would be idiotic to program such advanced AI to avoid those even in situations where you might die. I’ve seen you freeze up when you’re about to take a deadly hit in battle. No one smart enough to make AI with emotions would sabotage it with that.”

The words streamed through Brie's head, churning around within her mind, and no matter how much she wanted to fight it, wanted to be worthless, it felt impossible to argue with the logic. She wiped her hands over her face, trying to rub off all the uncertainty and fear and self-hatred.

“You’re not an imitation, Brie. You’re too unique for that. Too human. I can see your reaction every time we pass into Noctilum, how much one particular place fascinates you. I know the way you get businesslike and logically-focused on missions, but then let sentiment take over when it gets emotional — even when it sometimes endangers you or the mission objective; then, other times, you get invested in the mechanics of things enough that  _ that _ causes a problem. I’ve seen how differently you talk with different people, how you joke around even at weird times with me and then never seem to speak with people like Elma in any way except a matter-of-fact one. I know how you invested yourself further in understanding skells for my sake, but not more than you clearly felt like. All those weird hobbies of yours — journaling, reading through all the info and history and all that crap we’ve got from back on Earth, sitting around at the scenic views you like and just taking it all in, walking around aimlessly listening to passerby — yes, I know about that — they’re all unique and yet they all seem to fit together with who you are, one way or another. I’ve heard a bunch of your commonly-used words phase in and then permanently out of use out of preference for some other one. You were by my side through the whole deal with Mika and Camber, even when there wasn’t much reason to, yet you’ve blatantly declined similar requests from other people.” She laughed. “I’d say you don’t know how to mince words, but you kinda do; you just don’t care about it sometimes. Point is, you’re really complex and really special and I can’t even imagine you lacking free will, the same way I can’t imagine that of anyone else. So don’t think otherwise, okay?”

_ Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fucking hell, Alexa. _ Brie kept her face as shielded as possible; she might actually run out of the diner if her friend saw how much she was blushing.

“O-oh. Um, crap. Yeah. I did make that pretty awkward, huh? Uh...sorry about that.”

“N...no; it’s all right. You...probably don’t know how much that helped, but I — I appreciate it. A lot.”

From the Curator’s half-obstructed view, it was difficult to see what exactly Alexa was doing, but Brie had seen the motion enough to know that Alexa’s hand was again rubbing the back of her neck. “Hey, it’s nothing. Don’t be afraid to talk more about it whenever you need to; I’ll always listen. I mean, unless I’m in combat or something. Or unconscious. I make no promises if I’m unconscious. Not that you’d probably be in that situation. … Not that that would be a necessarily bad thing. Um — ”

“I get the idea,” Brie said, having recovered and thus uncovered her face — and now smiling faintly. “Thank you again. Truly. Now, it...seems as if you’re finished with the meal; I believe I myself am. Is that it, or were you planning on a dessert course?”

Alexa grinned. “Well, I wasn’t  _ planning _ on it, exactly, but I was hoping you might like the idea. In fact, I think I oughta treat you after all that.”

“Oh, no; I think exactly the opposite: that would be the swiftest way for me to thank you.”

“Nope! Deal’s done. Take it or I’ll just ask for the check now.”

“Well...if there’s no convincing you. Have it your way, then.”

Upon the waiter’s return — well, return wasn’t exactly appropriate, as the one who appeared at their table was not the same one who had left — the pair placed their orders, having taken only brief moments to decide while the waiter was clearing their plates. From then it was but a couple minutes before the food arrived — a simple pseudo-chocolate cake for Alexa, and the popular yet odd flavor of ice cream that the diner was most recognized for for Brie.

“Delicious?”

“It’s incredible,” Alexa said. “Hard to believe it’s made from only Miran ingredients, it’s so close to real chocolate. Yours?”

Taking a moment to lick the sides of the scoop before they dripped, Brie nodded. “Sublime.”

“What...what’s the flavor like? I actually haven’t treated myself to something like this in a while, I guess ‘cause that’s weird when you’re alone and I’m too big of a skell nut for people to offer most of the time, and when I do, I usually just fall for the...cake...but I’m….”

Brie stopped licking. “Are you all right?”

“Y-yeah! I’m all fine. Just lost my train of thought there. ‘Haven’t gone here in awhile, but I’m’...curious. Yeah.”

“It’s...difficult to describe, to be honest. Hm...is it possible to describe the taste of cow milk?”

“That’s true, I guess. I dunno how to describe it without talking about, like, other milk. Like...I dunno...yeah. No, I guess at least I can’t.”

A nod. “That’s about how it is with this. It’s difficult to compare it to anything else, except whatever flavor this is, I don’t think I’ve tasted anything quite similar before. It’s certainly tasty, though.”

“Sure looks like it. Oh, so, um, was this fun, or something? Maybe ‘fun’ isn’t the right word, but did you like it?”

“Yeah, certainly. While it hardly turned out...how I might have expected, I believe I’m glad you invited me. Very much better than heading home and having Lin’s Supper Rechauffé, tasty though her food is, and eating alone there before heading to sleep.”

“Better than my routine — grab something to eat and bring it with me to whatever skell or weapon I’m checking out. Sometimes I eat cold dinner in the cockpit of a skell. Really nice to be able to do, but the food’s always crap.”

Brie shook her head. “Dear god, you have to get out more. We should do this again, then, perhaps?”

“I’d be glad to. But let’s actually finish eating before saying the stuff people say just before leaving.”

“Oh, was that out of order?”

“Eh. We can make our own order.”


	5. A Bit of Consulting

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In order to figure out what the heck to do and what the heck is even going on, respectively, Brie and Alexa each separately seek some external aid.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Greetings all :)  
> This would be what is considered the somewhat cliché "both ends of a relationship-to-be talk it out with other people" chapter. Hopefully nothing seems too unrealistic or out-of-character or anything, since if there's any chapter with particular weakness, I expect this one to be it. Eh, I won't stress too much about it. Enjoy, and stay awesome!

_Alexa pulled Brie by the arm another step’s worth towards her, bridging her personal space smoothly. She could vaguely feel the Outfitter’s breath as it warmed the air between their faces._

_“What if I said...I want you to kiss me?”_

_Her response came out husky, short of breath. “Then...I believe I would.”_

_“And...what if I wanted you to touch me, too?”_

_“I — I’d do that...too….”_

_Pulled in by her companion’s lusting eyes, her burning face, Brie slipped a hand onto Alexa’s hip, and then another to her cheek, thumb brushing her lips. She could feel the heat throughout Alexa’s body as both of them leaned in closer, their lips drawing ever-nearer…._

Brie found herself tugged out of the dream abruptly, and she jerked upright in bed, consequently striking her forehead against the shoulder of a rather bemused Elma leaning over her. “Oh — good morning — sorry — I mean, thank you for coming to....”

“Don’t worry about it. What I’m more concerned about is what might cause you to be so jumpy this early in the morning.”

“O-oh, well, it’s really, um, nothing you would need to concern yourself with.”

The colonel gave her a scrutinizing look. “Is that so? Well, if there’s anything that does come up, feel completely free to talk to Lin and me about it.” She headed out of the room.

Instinctively, with some innate conviction, Brie called back — “Actually...erm, might I possibly broach such an issue over breakfast?”

* * *

“Sooo, what’s up?” Lin asked.

Sighing a bit, Brie attempted to summon some courage. “The short version is...well, there’s a girl I like.”

“Ooh, juicy! Gonna tell us who, or is that a piece of info too near to your heart?”

“I — well — there can’t possibly be any harm — it’s...um...Alexa.”

“The same one that happens to be called the ‘Skell Nut’?” said Elma.

The Curator nodded slowly, keeping her eyes strategically distanced from either of them. “The same.”

Lin passed the water down to Elma, who thanked her. “I remember seeing you two together a few times outside of those couple missions she’s been with us for. She’s pretty cool; I can say that.”

“I would have imagined the two of you might get along well,” Brie said.

“Oh, well, probably, but that’s not what you wanted to talk about is it?”

“...That’s true. She...well, when I put it like that, there isn’t much else to it. It’s difficult to stay silent about it now, and I have — let’s say — mixed feelings about doing so.”

Taking a place next to her, Elma considered this. “Well, as far as I’ve seen in the past, that’s not a new and unexpected sentiment. I do certainly understand the issue of...withholding information myself, while not in these general circumstances, and it never turned out very helpful to be secretive.”  
“Yeah, definitely. If it’s just gonna hurt to keep it bottled up, I say tell her.” Lin herself took a seat with the other two. “No point in hiding it if you trust her. And, uh, this is only what I think, but if you don’t think you can trust someone to decline politely, they’re not worth it.”

“All of that is definitely reasonable, but...there is a notable distinction between knowing what to do and being capable of performing it. I simply — I don’t want to make it a big production, so to speak.”

Elma took another sip of water. “I can’t say I’m all that useful to that end, looking back on my own actions. Thinking about it...no, unfortunately, I don’t believe I have anything. Lin?”

“Um, well, I don’t really know much about it either, but you could always try to speed up the process yourself, y’know? Maybe if you confessed and then said that, like, you just wanted to say it and it would be nice if you could get an answer so that it’s behind you?”

“That sounds...very appealing, if I’m being honest. Other than that that means giving up the romantic situation if somehow she were to accept, but I doubt such situations actually happen in reality.”

The skell mechanic laughed. “Aww, Brie, you don’t need to be so bleak about it! I mean, I know you’re worried, but it’s not so bad. You’re not risking your life or anything.”

“You’re right. All it is is...I’m afraid of losing what I already have.”

“Now, here is where I have to reiterate what Lin said earlier: if you’re afraid about what she’ll do, either you’re worrying too much, or she isn’t worth your dedication. If my time here on Mira has taught me anything about people, it’s that the good ones will always accept you — so long as you aren’t causing others harm.” She chuckled a little.

Brie nodded slowly. “I...that helps a lot. Thank you for — for the reassurance, I suppose it is.”

“Any time, Brie. You’re a friend in addition to being a team member, remember.”

“Yeah! And we don’t want lovesickness getting in the way of our missions.” Lin smiled. “Kidding, of course. We really care about you, okay? You can rely on us.”

* * *

“Ooh, hey! Alexa! What brings you down here to the Hangar?”

Alexa turned around, faintly surprised; a peppy-as-always Mia stood smiling behind her in greeting. “Oh, uhm, same as usual. Skells. I’ve been troubleshooting this screwy M-Missile for a while now. I’m more surprised to see you, actually. What’re you doing here?” _What’s she doing right now, I wonder? Probably out with the rest of Team Elma being awesome, as usual._

“Well, after my...most recent breakdown, I came here to grab my skell so I could head out to Oblivia for some questing.”

 _Can’t believe I’m stuck doing this. Wait, no, this is great! What are you thinking, Alexa?_ “That sounds pretty cool.” _...Still, though, it’d be nice if Brie were here so I could kiss her. I mean talk with her. I mean — kiss her? What? Since when do I —_

“Hey, you seem a little occupied, huh? Should I leave you be?”

Alexa tried her best to push these thoughts aside, just for a moment. “Maybe that would be a good idea…. No, wait, uh, could you actually stay a little longer? I — I think I need to talk about something.”

* * *

“Wow, how’d you get out of work that easily? If I tried that there’s no way I’d get a pass like that.”

Alexa collapsed onto the bench. “Well, as the trademarked Skell Nut, that’s probably the first time I’ve ever asked for time off like that. Tika was probably a little concerned, actually.”

“I’m kinda concerned too, y’know?” Mia said. “I mean, seeing you not spending every waking moment with skells is actually a little creepy. Like you’re actually a Definian posing as Alexa. Ohmygod, wait, no, are you really? You totally are, aren’t you?”  
“No, I’m just Alexa.” The Outfitter sighed. “I’m...having a bit of an identity crisis. That is, my feelings are.”

Mia raised her eyebrows. “Your feelings? For skells? _No._ Are you falling out of love with skells?!”

This time the suggestion drew out a laugh. “No. Skells are definitely still one of my favorite things on the planet. Well, on any planet. It’s, uhm, actually a person that my feelings are confused about.”

“Oh, really? Who?”

“...Brie.”

“Yeah? What feelings?”

Screaming internally, Alexa drew a breath. “I think I might, maybe, be...uh...falling for her?”

Now Mia was unable to hold back. “Really? That’s so great! I mean, not specifically because it’s her or anything, but that’s soooo sweeeet. Never mind. Sorry. I’ll try to be quiet; you can talk.”

“That’s okay, but thanks. It’s...well, ever since — y’know, maybe even ever since we met, she’s always been so weird and quirky and yet really cool too, sometimes all at once. I think she’s been opening up to me lately, and I thought that I was happy mainly because I was helping her, but now it feels more like...I don't know? Maybe it's not just that?”

“Well, there’s almost always one sure way to tell if you’ve fallen for someone.”

“...What’s that?”

“Imagining them topless and in bed with you.”

_Oh crap, oh crappity crap, I’m imagining it, you’re making me imagine it…._

Apparently Alexa was exactly as red as she felt, because not moments after answering her, Mia’s smile widened and she pumped her fist silently. “Well you passed _that_ test with flying...red colors. (Don’t mind my excitement; I’m just a bit of a fangirl for this sorta stuff.) I don't know if it's really that certain a method. Do _you_ think you’re in love?”

The whirlwind of some of her favorite recent memories spun through her head: Brie dispatching Ganglion mechanoids with flair, Brie helping her out with Mika, Brie joking around with her off-duty, Brie describing Aeris’ systems with Alexa on her lap, Brie actively searching for Alexa supporting her, Brie breaking down into tears while Alexa supported her...Brie's tongue as she worked on her ice cream….

“I...uhm, actually, I don’t know how it wasn’t obvious before now. Am I just that blind?”

"Well, you do focus a  _lot_ of attention on skells. I bet you're constantly occupied like that."

"Most of the time, yeah." She paused. "I think I should probably tell her."

“Really? This early?”

“Well, it's been pretty long; I just don't think I knew it. And I...I guess I don’t think I could hold it in for very long now that I know for sure what it is. Kinda...like how I obsess over skells, right? I, uh, can’t exactly control myself.”

Mia laughed. “Yeah, um, no kidding. You’ve gotta be one of the most obsessive people I’ve ever seen. So you’re not worried?”

“I don’t think it’s about worrying, more that I just don’t see any better way. I trust her. She won’t hate me even if she doesn’t feel the same way. But, uh, yeah, it...does make me feel kind of anxious. I don’t know what I’m gonna do if she says no, but — I can’t hide it. I don’t know how.”

“Oh. Well, I’m giving you a hundred ten percent of my support, since I made you figure it out.” The Curator let out a little chuckle. “Sorry about that.”

“No no no, that’s perfectly fine. I’m glad you helped.”

“If you ever get too anxious, just remind yourself what’ll happen if it goes well.”

Trying yet again not to blush, Alexa shook her head, stifling a giggle. “That’s...probably not gonna make me less anxious. Thanks though.”

“Any time! You should probs get back to work though. Someone’s totally gonna worry if you take any more time away from your babies.”

“Hey, it’s not _that_ bad….”

“Nah, it totally is. See ya another time!”

Mia set off before Alexa’s responsive “see ya” left her mouth. _Jeez. She might even be more energetic than_ I _can handle sometimes. But she’s definitely a good one._

Vacating the bench, she headed back towards the hangar, brain spinning with ideas and plans, which were — for once in her life on Mira — not about skells.


	6. Energy Mist

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's that time of...(year? day? month? fanfic? plot?)...plot: someone has to say something. Then someone else has to say something. Then they get to do something. It's really very riveting.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *shrugs* It's, well, it's pretty clear what's going on in this chapter. Actually, this is the last chapter with any plot in it; since you probably saw the rating tag (it looks like two upside-down connected "V"s, in case that's not clear, lol), you know what the next chapter will be all about. ... Did I hear someone say making sweet, sweet Miran cake? ...Yes. You're exactly right. You're so right that you don't even need to come back and read the next chapter and prove that you're right.
> 
> I'm not entirely sure about how well the title works, so you all are just gonna have to judge me on it silently, haha.
> 
> Hope you enjoy (I certainly did in the process of writing it), and have a great day, as well!

Worry was beginning to set in. It had been days since Brie had last seen her skell-infatuated friend, and no one else appeared to have a clue to offer her as to the reason. And so while she herself couldn’t explain why, the Curator had chosen to plop herself and Lila down on top of BLADE Tower, sitting and gazing out over Primordia’s mist-gathering lowlands and slowly-reddening spires as the afternoon grew old.

“Difficult to beat this, huh, Lila?” she murmured.

_Right. As if you’re satisfied right now._

“Well...at least it does look pretty.”

_Know what else looks pretty?_

“Hush. I’m trying to enjoy myself, thank you very much.”

Sighing, she let herself fall onto her back, stretching. _Ugh, what I wouldn’t give for something to take my mind off of things._

A sudden flash of movement behind her nearly shocked her off of the roof — the near-disaster pulling her back to the center out of mortal fright. Facing the source more carefully, it was without a doubt Maxima — and one particular Alexa inside it. The Excavator model landed as softly as a skell could, and the Outfitter popped out quite promptly.

“Um, hey. Another one of your weird sit-and-stare-at-the-landscape periods, I guess?”

“Something like that. You nearly frightened me off the tower. I was going to have you pay for damages.”

Though Brie gave her her trademarked half-smile, she didn’t react as usual. “Uh, yeah. Actually, I was looking for you for a mission that I need to get done. You able to help out?”

“Oh — certainly. Right now?”

“The sooner, the better, I’d say.”

“Well, all right, then. Where to?”

“Noctilum. Follow me.”

Boarding her skell again — not quite in the same manner as normal — Alexa lifted off into the sky above BLADE Tower; desiring not to slow her down, the Curator followed briskly.

The trip didn’t resemble the usual, either. Instead of joking around so much, both of the women were mostly silent for the flyby through Primordia. Brie did get a close-up view to some of the landmarks that she found more intriguing than the others, and certainly the drive was peaceful, but it was as if something else not quite definite was in the air.

_Maybe this is something that has to do with you. There is no way she would suddenly disappear and return and then not say a thing about it._

_Well, that isn’t about you, is it? It’s definitely about her._

“...And here’s Noctilum.”

For a near-minute, Brie again allowed herself to be overcome by the sight of the region, especially in the glittering beauty of the energy mist, but it ended more quickly than normal when the thought crossed her mind: “So what is the quest about?”

“Oh — uhm — I don’t know exactly everything because I wasn’t told all of it, but there was this one nopon in the commercial district that wanted someone to find a necklace that he dropped when on the Nopon Braidbridge somewhere. He said he looked a long time for it and couldn’t come up with anything, but, you know how nopon are. And, yeah, it is a pretty lame mission to take, but once I started talking with the little guy it wasn’t like I could refuse. I thought I could probably use a couple more eyes to help out which is why I came looking for you, and plus I didn’t think you’d be as bored as someone else might since I know you like the Noctilum scenery….”

“You seem to have done a fair deal of thinking about it, at least.”

The Outfitter chuckled weakly. “Yeah. I guess I have.”

A fabricated smile on her face, Brie nodded and then turned back to her thoughts. There could be no doubt that something wasn’t entirely right with her partner. _But what is it?_ Ascertaining it felt an impossible task. _God, did she figure out that I like her? Could she have? She did seem to be avoiding me. But wh —_

“Let’s land down here. Maybe we can get a good look at the area from there.”

The Curator followed Alexa’s direction down to Decapotamon Vista, both parking their skells beside the slight overhang that looked over the lake.

“Okay — if we go, uhm, this way, we should probably be able to get the best vantage point — ”

Alexa stopped. Running a hand through her garnet hair, she turned around to face her companion. “Uhm. Okay. Gonna be completely honest here: I kinda just lied about that whole quest thing.”

“...Um, all right? That’s perfectly fine, just...I’m...a bit confused now.”

“Yeah.” She nodded. “I — that makes sense. … Sorry.”

“No; it’s fine.” Brie could feel her heartbeat growing stronger.

A brief pause; the Outfitter wasn’t looking at her. “I, uhm, just wanted to — say something. I guess.”

“I’m listening.”

“Okay.” Shaking her head — it seemed involuntary — and taking a deep breath, Alexa continued: “So, uh, it’s been, what, three or so months since we first actually met? All those problems I was having with Mika seem way long ago. I was (well, I still am) really glad you helped me out, but I totally didn’t know that it would be more beneficial than that. It’s really nice having you around — I mean, hell, you’re funny and cool and, despite it being hard to tell from the exterior, actually pretty similar to me. And I don’t think I’ve ever felt worse seeing someone break down than when it happens to you — that’s not a bad thing; all it means is I...care a lot about your well-being.

“For a pretty long time I kinda just took that like it was normal, because I guess I didn’t feel like thinking too much about it. Or maybe I was scared? I dunno. But, uhm, seeing you again somehow makes it a hundred percent clear. I — damn it, this is gonna be hard to say — I want to...make sure you’re safe, I want to comfort you if you get sad or scared or whatever, and I kind of want that from you, too. Well, it’s, uhm, it’s a bit bigger than that. I — oh damn it, I’m sorry if this is hard to hear — I...I’m…. I’m in love with you, Brie.”

The mounting heat from within Brie's core surged through her body as soon as the words registered. _Oh god, oh fuck, oh god, oh shoot oh help me…._

“ —Are you...okay? I’m really sorry; I probably shouldn’t have done something l — ”

“Alexa.”

The name came out barely louder than a whisper. Brie's head was nearly spinning, her body close to overheating, her heart’s throbbing almost painful.

“...Yeah?”

Taking a delicate step closer, she locked eyes with her partner. “It’s — you are telling the truth, right? This isn’t...something else?”

“I — well...yeah, i-it’s all true. Really, I’m s — ”

Another careful step. “Then I…have to tell the truth too. I….” _Thump-thump. Thump-thump. Thump-thump._ The pulse eclipsed everything but her thoughts, her voice, Alexa’s face. “I like y-you — agh, fuck — I’m in love with you too.”

Wide eyes. A flush of deep scarlet. Caught breath. “You — wh — you are?”

Brie inched one final step forward, softly slipped the fingers of one hand around Alexa’s wrist, let them slide down to interlace themselves with those of her companion. Their eyes locked, Brie's filled with an overflowing softness, Alexa’s with a shock-affected longing. “I...am. And...I think I — um, really want to kiss you.”

The red eyes strayed briefly from the Curator’s, but found themselves drawn back with renewed desire. A hand rested itself on Brie's side and gave her a tight squeeze. “I...really wanna kiss you, too….”

“Then — ”

After gazing for a second longer into Alexa’s eyes, Brie's attention fell to her lips — and returned for just a moment with the same wanting look present in her partner. She leaned in closer, tilting her head just slightly; at the same time as she felt an arm extend around her back, Alexa leaned in, too, and their lips touched.

Instantly the sensation resonated all the way through the Curator’s body — coursing a tantalizing electric path along her arms and down into her legs — and she shifted her mouth slightly to link more smoothly with Alexa’s. Pressing together, hugging tenderly, the pair stayed in the position for another long moment before pulling inches apart.

“That...heh, uhm, that felt really good.”

There was no further that Brie could blush. “Incredibly.”

“Makes me...a bit hot. A lot hot. Could we...do that again?”

“...I couldn’t want that more.”

Alexa bridged the gap much faster this time, now eager for something Brie wasn’t quite certain the identity of yet — that was, until the Outfitter pushed with her upper lip much farther between Brie own lips. Instinctively, Brie opened her mouth just a bit, but let lust overcome her and pressed back. Alexa started sucking slightly on her upper lip, eliciting a hum of pleasure. Then, pulling out for just a half-second, she kissed again, commencing a soft and rhythmic chain of shorter kisses: not quite coordinated but not quite sloppy; each one ending with the faint wet sound of their lips separating.

On Brie's back, Alexa’s hands caressed with a warming care, chaste in comparison to their kisses. Maybe it had been a primer, because in the next moment Alexa’s tongue found its way into her partner’s mouth. Moaning slightly, she responded in kind, and soon she found her tongue and its passion entwining with the Outfitter’s, savoring the feeling, the taste of both Alexa’s tongue and mouth. Forging her own advances by licking inside her companion’s mouth provocatively, she brought out in Alexa what she had brought out in her — that inadvertent, instinctual whimper — and the two continued similarly for much longer than Brie could ever have dreamed.

Eventually, of course, they had to pause, and it was with with concurrence that they slowed to a stop, staring speechlessly into each other’s steaming faces. Brie could still taste her friend’s saliva in her mouth.

Words finally reached the Curator. “Oh my god...you’re...that was...so good.”

“...Yeah. I...I don’t think I’ve ever felt better than — all that.”

“So are we — dating now? Did you want to do that?”

“So totally yes. Do you?”

“Definitely.”

Alexa glanced back at their skells. “Darn. Now I wish I could ride back to NLA in the same skell as you.”

“Surrounded by the two biggest loves in your life?”

She giggled. “Yeah.”

“Well, I think we can just sit here together for a while longer before heading back instead.”

“Trying to get as much of this view as you can?”

“Call me selfish. I don’t particularly want to leave you right now, either.”

“That’s okay. Me neither.”


	7. Camping Out

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Brie and Alexa spend some quality time together.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> God, this took longer than expected. I was going to make this longer, but then all the inspiration promptly disappeared, and I left it like that for, what, how many months? Anyway. Instead of actually finishing it, I cut it off partway through and ended it nicely there. Fortunately, I doubt many people were waiting for this.
> 
> This will, obviously, be my last entry in this fanfic. In terms of my own activity, I will probably become active again after some time once I'm mostly or fully done with another fic I'm in the process of writing. Enjoy!

Brie holstered Lila’s diskbombs for what appeared to be the last time that night. “Fortunate that this is skell work. I would hate to deal with the cold on foot.”

“Yeah. I mean, I’d be in my skell anyway, but yeah. You’d think that maybe the ECP would’ve considered, like, making our mims cold- and heat-resistant, right? I mean, we do have _some_ superhuman strengths.”

“I would have voted for that. But I suppose the issue has passed now.”

“So are we gonna try heading back to NLA?”

The Curator grimaced. “I certainly don’t love the idea. Maybe we—I at least—could sleep at one of the base camps.”

“Nah, I agree. I’ll stick with you in that case.”

“Off, then?”

“Yep! I’ll let you lead.”

The trip took only a minute or so; parking their skells alongside the rooms—what were they even called? Nothing seemed to quite fit them—and heading towards the one still-present watchperson.

“Looking for a room, I bet?” the man said, suppressing a yawn.

“Anything available?”

“Of course; it’s not like anyone in their right mind would want to be stuck in the middle of the Aaroy Plains at night.”

Alexa laughed. “Yeah, okay, if that’s your way of saying you’re judging us, you’re kinda right. There’s maybe, what, an ounce of sense between the two of us?”

“Most of it comes from me, though.”

“Oh, shush. Kudos for sticking out this late, brief friend. We’re gonna head in.”

“Fair enough. Enjoy yourselves.”

_ Enjoy ourselves? This isn’t some fancy hotel room. _

Brie let her girlfriend head in first, closing the door behind them after herself entering. It wasn’t exactly capacious, but there was enough space for a sizable bed and a largish all-purpose storage cabinet. “Quaint.”

“Looks nice enough to me,” Alexa said, flopping down on the bed. “—Oh, uh, right. I guess we’re sleeping together?”

A very faint blush.  _ Don’t phrase it like that. I’ll get ideas. _ “Apparently we are. Do you, um, want to undress first? Do you undress when you go to sleep?”

“I’m not  _ that _ odd. Yeah; I guess...I can do that. Try not to look, okay? It’s...y’know. Embarrassing.”

“If you don’t look back either we can change at the same time.”

“Oh. True. Uhm, okay.”

What with all the complexity, it was difficult to efficiently disrobe from her battle gear—and especially so when it was designed for style as well as combat capability. Alexa had the relatively simple task of removing her gloves and then getting out of her short-sleeved reginal raim and tythes via the zipper down the middle, but some of Brie’s on-foot gear required more work. She unclasped the metal casings on each leg of her brogs, which were effectively leggings once the metal came off, and the pointed plates on her brax were manually removable, leaving her to detach and set aside the metal on her Sakuraba suit, the chestpiece to which the material of her brax had been fused to (the softer synthetic fiber, not metal-to-metal or she would never have been able to get out of it). After a half-minute or so, she heard Alexa’s “Okay; I’m done,” and responded—“I’ll be done in a bit longer. Battle armor is a pain.”

Another minute or so, and she was done. “All right. Set.”

Both of them turned around at about the same time—and Brie, for one, was unable to look away from her partner.  _ Those curves...unngh.  _ “Right, then...anything else you need to get ready?”

“A little bit, yes.”

“Don’t worry about it; I do too.”

Despite having things left to do, they took up quite little time; when they were completely ready, Alexa was first to usher her companion under the covers.

Glancing back up at her, Brie said to Alexa, “So are you getting in?”

“...Yeah. Yeah, guess I am.” Plopping down on the edge of the bed first, she slipped her legs under the covers and then pulled the blankets over them, lying down on her back. At the motion, Brie tried to relax, turning away from her and curling up a little on her side in her normal sleeping position. Her back rubbed briefly against Alexa's arm, and she heated.

_ This is...normally the situation in which  _ that _ happens, correct? But that would be impossible. Jeez, Brie—she's probably not even the type to think about something like that…. _

“Hey, you aren't ignoring me, are you? Don't hide.” Her smile was audible.

A low current coursed a shiver down the Curator's spine. “...I'm...not.”

Slowly, she turned back to face her. Warm red-orange eyes gazed at her—not intensely, but strong enough to make Brie more than a bit hot and bothered.

“Your...uhm...your face looks pretty red. You sure you don't have a fever?”

“...Mims...don't get fevers, Alexa.”

“I know. Just—wanted to strike up some conversation.”

“We can...talk or whatever if you like. Or we can not. Either way.”

Alexa turned a bit more onto her side, facing Brie almost directly, her eyes flickering between her friend's face and the bed. “And what if I, uhm...just want t...to be with my girlfriend all night?”

“You...well...you get that either way.” The half-hearted chuckle was more out of distraction than anything else. “I mean, you  _ are _ in...in bed with me.”

A soft shake of her head. “Yeah...but...what if I wanna be...closer?”

“You can be as close as you want,” Brie said more quietly.

Alexa scooched closer. Her arms looped themselves around her lover's hips. Their noses were inches apart. “Closer?”

“Yeah.” It was a whisper.

Another short rustling. The pair's knees brushed against each other. Alexa's hands clasped together behind Brie's back. “Closer?”

“...Mm-hm.”

Their legs began to entwine. Brie felt their chests lightly press together, and she feared that Alexa could hear her pounding heart. Not knowing where to put her arms, she finally followed Alexa's example and wrapped them around her loosely.

“...How about closer?”

Alexa's breath—its shortness barely noticeable—was able to swirl into Brie's centimeters-open-mouth now; all she could sense were the two desirous pupils before her and their owner's beautiful, sexy face. “......Yes….”

A furiously red face nodded once against the pillow, next taking a long glance at Brie's lips. Then, it inched forwards, mouth half-open, eyes closing.

A kiss. It was long and savory at first; they exchanged slow lip massages at length as if molding them together, and Brie started idly rubbing fond circles on Alexa's back with her fingertips, not entirely conscious of it. As the hypnotic motion grew progressively more passionate, and the Curator was suddenly struck by the reality of the situation—her, in bed with her lover, skin-to-skin and making out—it was too much. For just one second, she lost control.

Abruptly she severed the kiss—but only pulled away enough to speak. She was on fire. Every part of her body was humming with a new and irrepressible energy. Something wet made itself known between her thighs.

“Alexa—I really wanna fuck. Right now.”

Brie could see the emotions swirling: shock, desire, uncertainty, then something impossibly soft and impossibly lusty, all at the same time. The expression alone turned her on. Five words: “I'm...glad you do too.”

Then Alexa pulled her back in with another kiss, and Brie let any semblance of restraint leave her as she answered with a heated tonguing. Swapping saliva copiously, they began exploring each other's mouths with fervent need; at Brie's signal they started a passionate, wrestling embrace, too, caressing and rubbing and touching whatever they could reach.

The invasive making-out continued for a long, pleasurable while until Alexa found the clasp to her partner's bra, undoing it smoothly just as Brie began to do the same for her. The undergarments plopped silently to the ground. Brie felt her hardened nipples rub against Alexa's; at the new arousal, she paused, letting it wash over her, so she wasn’t ready when Alexa cupped her breast and began fondling it with some combination of care and necessity that the Curator couldn’t quantify at the same time as she was being touched.

“I’m curious—how long have you wanted this?” whispered the Outfitter.

“Comfortably? Since we started—ahn—started dating. Otherwise? W-well, um...a lot...a lot earlier.”

“Hmh. So lewd.”

“You say as you—”

Alexa interrupted Brie with an abrupt return to her breasts, making the latter cry out as her mouth found its place around her nipple and beginning to suckle on it. Then, running her tongue over it once ravishingly, she slid sideways to the other one, and the overwhelmed low whimpers that Brie couldn't control began to turn more sexual as the pleasure heightened.

It was too much. “Please, give me more. I need it.”

“Of course,” said Alexa, drawing a line with one continuous lick down the Curator's front towards her stomach, and then lower, pressing kisses upon her girlfriend’s underwear.

“You...need to take that off.”

“You’re so impatient.”

Sliding the underwear down and off, Alexa ran her tongue over Brie’s clit smoothly, slow enough to pay attention to Brie's reaction—a low groan of pleasure. “God, Alexa….”

She continued licking, at first slow and covering everything, eventually starting to probe more precisely for what felt best to Brie. Lustful whimpers permeated the room; the heated atmosphere invigorated Alexa and drove her to work faster, more intense, licking in a way that launched Brie towards a swift climax she could hardly believe and yet could never even dream of herself.

“—Alexa—aaaaaahhh —!”

Incredible. Brie couldn't describe it as anything else. She lay there panting, pleasure resonating within her, her body warmer than it had ever been.

“How was I?” Alexa queried in an undertone.

“Just...perfect.”

“I want something back next time, though.”

“Of course you do. I’d better study up.”

“As if I’ve had any more experience with sex than you?”

“Well, it certainly feels like you have.”

“Don’t bother yourself with that self-esteem crap. You’re in bed with the woman you love, and both of you are very nice and soft. Isn’t that enough for you tonight?”

Brie smiled. “You’re right about that.”


End file.
